Shadow Days
by r4ven3
Summary: This is another one shot, set after the end of S10, and so providing an alternate, and more satisfying ending to the story. Like a flower the story unfolds, so I can't say any more without revealling too much of the plot.


"_And I'm open, knowing somehow_

_That my shadow days are over"_

_\- _John Mayer, from "_Shadow Days"_

* * *

An hour north of London – May 2013:

He opens the lychgate, stepping into the shade of the ancient shingled roof, the scent of wisteria blooms filling his nostrils as he passes through to the churchyard where a colleague lies buried. He knows exactly where to find her grave, having visited it many times in his imagination, and even in his dreams, his journey there fueled by so many regrets surrounding her life, and then her death. It appears to him that death is the only force in the universe capable of stilling her energy, her fierce intelligence, along with her razor-sharp tongue.

His wife has remained in the car, claiming her presence by his side would be more likely to distract than provide support. He knows his wife well enough to leave her be, to not insist she accompany him on this, the last and potentially most problematic leg of his pilgrimage. He has devoted one day of each week to visiting the resting place of a member of his former team. He has already been to the graves of Helen, and Danny, Colin, Fiona and Adam, and all the others. On this day he is paying his respects to his most beloved former colleague … or one of them, because in his own private way, he had loved each one with a fierce pride and passion. He tells himself he would still gladly trade his own life for the return of any one of them, although his wife might have something to say about that.

More than once she has suggested it is time for him to cut the ties with his past, and this time he agrees with her. He can no longer drag his guilt with him to infect what remains of his life. There is a shadow, a presence which has followed him in the decades since the death of Bill Crombie. Within that shadow he has nurtured regret for actions not taken, orders given in haste, or outcomes not seen in advance. As each year has drawn to a close the shadow has darkened and deepened, weighing him down. His wife agrees that it is high time he leave his darker past where it belongs, so that he can join her fully in their life together.

As he stands at the foot of Ros's grave, hands stuffed into the pockets of his chinos, his eyes focused on the names of her parents – Annabel and Jocelyn – he allows his mind to wander freely through some of the last conversations he'd shared with her. Only then does he admit to himself that Ros had chosen her own life, and perhaps even her own death. Nothing he'd said could have changed that. He has been carrying responsibility for something which, in all probability, has had nothing at all to do with him. Were she able in that moment to communicate with him Ros would be scathing of his self-indulgence.

_I lived my life on my own terms, __Harry, _she'd say_. There's nothing I would change, including my death__. __I __never expected__ a__ happy ending.__Besides, I __always fancied going out with a__ bang. _

Harry finds he is smiling. He feels his jaw softening, and his shoulders loosening. He is at last letting go. Suddenly aware of his surroundings he glances around him. Thankfully he is alone in the churchyard. It is early afternoon, but no-one else is around, and his is still the only car in the car-park. As his gaze embraces the wider environment of the church and churchyard his attention is drawn to the spot by the fence where he'd asked Ruth to marry him. That had not been his finest hour. Only now, with the wisdom only the passing of time can provide, can he see how poorly timed his proposal had been, how his devastation in the wake of Ros's death had led him to desperately longing to formalise his bond with Ruth. Small wonder she'd turned him down; small wonder she'd not been able to look him in the eye. They had both done what they always did when faced with disappointment – they'd discussed work.

He pulls his gaze from the spot where his proposal had been rejected. He'd not asked her again. He who had faced enemy agents nose to nose with barely a thought for his own safety hadn't had the fortitude to face further rebuff from Ruth. To compensate he'd buried himself in work, and they'd each become painfully polite towards one another. That is, until that day at the Thames Estuary, the day when Sasha Gavrik had attempted to kill him.

"Harry? Are you alright?"

He swings around to see his wife approaching. Having left the warm confines of their car's interior, her cheeks are flushed. As always when he sees her, he relaxes and smiles. His wife – his finest choice, although to be fair, in the end it was she who had chosen him. She steps beside him, putting one arm around him to rub his back in an ever-increasing circular motion. How he relishes the many ways in which she loves him.

"How has it been?" she says at last, looking up at him, her expression unreadable.

As if searching for inspiration, Harry glances back at Ros's grave before once more turning towards her. "It was easier than I thought," he says gently. "It was only today that I recognised that Ros chose her own life .. as well as her own death."

"We all do, Harry," she says, rubbing his back once more before dropping her hand to grasp the fingers of his right hand. "Everything we do is governed by a choice we have made at some level, even if we're unaware of having made that choice."

"So .. when you turned down my marriage proposal it was your choice to do so?"

"Of course." She smiles up at him. "And it was my choice two years later to be the one to suggest we get married, because I knew you'd not raise the subject again."

"No. I wasn't about to revisit that particular … embarrassment."

"Everything Ros did was her choice, even if it was dangerous."

"_Especially_ when it was dangerous," Harry adds. Then he sighs heavily, at last seeing where the conversation is headed. And _he_ is meant to be the one skilled in interrogation! He just hadn't seen it coming. Love has clearly made him soft. "I suppose this is all about Catherine," he says quietly, not able to look at her directly, although he squeezes her fingers in recognition of her superior interrogation skills.

"Only in part," she says. "You have to let her return to the Middle East with your blessing, Harry. She is doing something she loves, something she believes in." _Just like you were_ is implied.

"And if she dies, or is injured?"

"Then it will have been her choice, just as it was Ros's choice to enter that hotel -"

"- and it was Danny Hunter's choice to take a bullet for Fiona," he adds, before bending down to place a quick kiss on her lips. "My wise Ruth," he says, his face still close to hers.

"While I was in the car I had a call from the Grid." Harry frowns. That can't be good news. It has been almost a year since he and Ruth left the service. "It was a courtesy call from Calum Reid. I suspect he needed to speak to you, and assumed you'd be with me."

"I hope you didn't give him my new mobile phone number."

"Of course not. I respect your wishes. He had news about Dimitri, and thought you might want to know."

"It's good news?" Harry asks.

"As good as it could be under the circumstances." Ruth waits a long few seconds, but he knows better than to hurry her along. She will tell him about the call from Calum in her own time … in Ruth time. "All charges against Dimitri have been dropped."

Harry takes a step away from Ruth so that their hands disengage. He breathes out the pent-up tension he'd been unaware he'd been holding. When he turns back to her he notes her frown. "I'd been worried," he says by way of explanation. "The tribunal had taken its time about investigating Dimitri's part in Sasha's death. I was sure it was going to end badly."

Ruth nods. She had thought the same thing. The Russians had insisted that a tribunal be held to investigate the events surrounding the death of Sasha Gavrik, and the Home Office were keen to stay sweet with Russia. In the nineteen months since the events at the Thames Estuary the Tribunal had met a total of four times. Ruth couldn't see why it had taken so long. After all, everyone present on that day had reported essentially the same sequence of events.

Taking a shard of glass from a broken window, Sasha Gavrik had gone looking for Harry.

Seeing Harry talking with Ruth, Sasha had approached them quickly, his intent clear.

Ruth had turned from Harry, intending to talk Sasha down.

In his attempt to ensure Ruth was out of harm's way, Harry had shoved her, and she'd stumbled and fallen.

Harry approached Sasha, aiming to calm him, one hand lifted towards him.

Sasha, ignoring Harry's attempt at negotiation, had lunged towards him, stabbing him in his upper left abdomen with the shard of glass.

Sasha then stepped away as Harry fell to the ground, giving Dimitri a clear shot with his hand gun. The shot entered Sasha's chest, immediately felling him.

By the time Dimitri and Calum reached Sasha, the young Russian was dead.

As Ruth had witnessed the events of the afternoon, it was cut and dried. There was no ambiguity. Aiming to atone for the death of his own mother at the hands of his father, Sasha had, in a moment of grief and temporary madness blamed Harry, and attempted to kill him. Dimitri had acted to prevent further bloodshed; after all, Ruth herself had still been on the ground nearby, and could have been Sasha's next target.

Harry had been airlifted to St Thomas's Hospital for surgery. The glass had cut a deep and jagged wound in his flesh, which the surgeon had later told him was: _a bit messy and tricky, but was never going to be fatal due to __that rather unhealthy__ layer of insulation __around your middle_. The surgeon had followed this report with a summary:_ All is now tickety-boo,_ and that Harry could now, after a few day's rest: _get on with whatever it is you fellows do all day._ Harry had spent two nights in hospital before being allowed home, where Ruth had visited him with sympathy and flowers.

"_Flowers_, Ruth?" he'd commented with his usual sarcasm. "You expected me to die, didn't you?"

"So you think that while you were in surgery I bought flowers just so I could lay them on your grave … or give them to you now if you pulled through?"

Despite him clearly being in some pain Harry had grinned widely.

And that is where their proper courtship had begun, in the aftermath of an attempt on Harry's life. How like her and Harry to wait until the life of one of them had been threatened before they began to openly address what they each already knew – that for years they had been bound together by some unspoken, but overwhelming force which along the way had miraculously metamorphosed into a deep and enduring love and respect.

It took another five months for Ruth to raise the subject of marriage. It had been a Friday evening in late March as they were driving to Harry's house at the end of a long and trying week. The Home Secretary had been under pressure from his party to resign, and Ruth hadn't known if she'd still have a job to go to. Harry, on the other hand, was worried that the woman waiting in the wings to take Towers' job was not happy with the escalating cost of the intelligence service. While he wasn't especially concerned for his own future he was worried on behalf of his young team. It had been a silent trip, the atmosphere in the car heavy with their darkest thoughts.

They were stopped at a set of traffic lights, a Mozart Cantata playing on Radio 3, each of them quietly contemplating where their lives might be headed. "I think we should get married," she'd blurted, having decided that it was now or never.

"Could you please repeat that?" Harry had said, turning towards her, unable to hide his shock, that is until an angry cacophony of car horns from the line of cars behind them had let them know that the lights had changed and they'd best drive off.

They were married the following July, a quiet and intimate wedding, and after a week in Paris, they retired to Ruth's cottage in Suffolk.

"What about Dimitri's job?" Harry asks quietly, his voice jolting Ruth back into the present.

"The job is still his if he wants it, but Calum suspects he's ready for a change. Maybe he'll head back to the ocean."

"You make him sound like a beached whale," Harry murmurs.

"That's rather an apt analogy, Harry," she observes, smiling up at him.

"Shall we go?" he suggests, lifting his eyebrows. After all, there is no further reason for them to remain in the churchyard. His job there is done.

"Yes please, but I need a drink before we head home."

"It's a bit early in the day for wine," he replies, not altogether seriously.

"I meant coffee. It's a two hour drive, and we both require something before we head home."

"A coffee sounds good," he says, smiling as Ruth slides her hand inside his elbow as they stroll along the path towards the lychgate, "then home .. to our house .. in Suffolk."

Ruth drops her head and smiles. Her home, the one she had chosen with just herself in mind is now_ their_ home. She must have made that choice on behalf of them both without having to consult Harry, without even knowing whether he'd want to share the cottage with her. Sometimes life is like that. All in all they're a bloody miracle.


End file.
